Draft Letter to ICANN Board & CEO

[Robin Gross]

Bill,

You make a very good point of beefing up the substantive points about  
what is wrong with SIC's charter.  The board might not care about  
process violations, but if they can see how these process violations  
will lead to a terrible charter model, they might be more inclined to  
care and do something.   If it is only a "process violation" with  
little harm on the community they might not care so much.

Thanks,
Robin


On Aug 12, 2009, at 7:02 AM, William Drake wrote:

> Hi
>
> On Aug 11, 2009, at 11:05 PM, Avri Doria wrote:
>
>> Note: i was never in favor of constituency-less SG charters, but  
>> that is what NCUC bottom up process originally decided on, and as  
>> I understand only changed when it became clear that it would not  
>> be allowed.  At least not for the NCSG.  I apologize for my role  
>> in helping to convince NCUC to back down on that (and some other  
>> stuff) - but i never envisioned that the Board would allow it - i  
>> was wrong.
>
> Avri, this is not a criticism, just my own puzzlement:  I have  
> never entirely understood why you have characterized NCUC as having  
> proposed a "constituency-less" charter.  From v. 1 circulated by  
> Milton to the list on 9 November last year, there were community- 
> formed, SG-approved groupings called constituencies.  If what you  
> mean is that unless the board approves them they cannot rightly be  
> considered constituencies in the normal ICANN sense (as you note,  
> we changed this pre-Mexico when we heard that it was a sticking  
> point in the Board's view) ok I get your meaning, but others who  
> are not bylaws-attuned may not appreciate that that definitional  
> requirement is the basis of the characterization.  Just wondering  
> because the "NCUC vs constituencies" framing been central to the  
> little bits of justification we've variously been given for what's  
> supposed to be wrong with our charter.  Supposedly we somehow  
> wanted to marginalize them in order to capture and control, which  
> of course was never the case, so I'm skittish about how this gets  
> posed discursively.
>
> Interesting to consider how this issue is addressed in the staff  
> summary of the public comment period.  It's characterized as the  
> key difference between the NCUC and SIC versions, and staff notes,
>
> 'The V-NCSG proposes that all members of the SG - organizations,  
> large and small, as well as individuals - become direct members of  
> the NCSG while “constituencies” are voluntary self-forming (ad hoc)  
> groupings that may be freely formed and dissolved for the purposes  
> of coalescing and advancing particular policy positions. In this  
> model, constituencies have no electoral or voting functions, per  
> se, within the SG.'
>
> I guess the quotes mean that our constituencies are not true  
> constituencies in the ICANN sense.  But this is odd, since we  
> ultimately conceded that, "The procedures for becoming a Board- 
> recognized Constituency within the NCSG are contained in the ICANN  
> Bylaws and other procedures approved by the Board."  Also odd is  
> the statement that they'd have no electoral or voting functions,  
> when we say,
>
> "Constituency Rights and Responsibilities.  Each NCSG Constituency  
> shall:
> 1.            Elect/appoint representative(s) to serve on the NCSG EC;
> 2.            Nominate candidates and participate in elections for  
> GNSO Council Representatives (CR);
> 3.            Develop and issue policy and position statements with  
> particular emphasis on ICANN consensus policies that relate to  
> interoperability,
> 		technical reliability and stable operation of the Internet or  
> domain name system;
> 4.            Participate in the GNSO policy development processes;
> 5.            Select Nominating Committee delegate(s) as directed  
> by the ICANN Board; and
> 6.            Perform any other functions identified by the ICANN  
> Board, GNSO Council, or the NCSG as Constituency responsibilities."
>
> Ok, we don't say each constituency is guaranteed a seat on the  
> council per CP80, but the staff version doesn't do that anymore  
> either.  So how exactly do we supposedly mess up this singularly  
> important issue?  By not forcing individuals into constituencies if  
> they want to be in the NCSG?
>
> I'm wondering if we shouldn't be trying to address this more  
> directly in the letter.  It seems to me that the take off point for  
> Mary's excellent draft is procedural, rather than substantive.  We  
> lead with a complaint about how our processes and inputs have been  
> ignored:  Paragraph 1 attributes the board's decision to "  
> continuing misperceptions and misinformation about the true extent  
> of involvement by non-commercial entities and individuals in the  
> year-long process that led to NCUC’s original proposal for an NCSG  
> Charter."  I can easily imagine board people thinking, gee we're  
> sorry you feel bad, but what matters is the end product, and we  
> don't like yours.
>
> We of course have to make the process points, but since these  
> haven't yet swayed them and are unlikely to in the future, might it  
> not make sense to get more quickly, and in more detail, to our  
> substantive problems with the SIC version?  Right now, that  
> discussion doesn't start until page 7.  I recall Milton wrote up  
> some good material a ways back on the SIC version's dysfunctional  
> aspects (although the wired council seats aspect is no longer  
> operative, at least for the first year).  Maybe that could be  
> tweaked and drawn in here?
>
> Bottom line, a priori I would think we are better off emphasizing  
> up front that there are reasons why we rejected the sort of model  
> they've embraced and would have a hard time operating within it,  
> and then addressing afterwards the ways in which we've been  
> mistreated, since the latter quite obviously is not dispositive for  
> them.
>
> Bill




IP JUSTICE
Robin Gross, Executive Director
1192 Haight Street, San Francisco, CA  94117  USA
p: +1-415-553-6261    f: +1-415-462-6451
w: http://www.ipjustice.org     e: robin at ipjustice.org



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